It has happened under every manager since Fergie left...

The players reach a point where they visibly stop putting in the appropriate level of effort, results go south and the clamour for change of management becomes irresistible.

Yesterday’s game against Southampton was painful to watch – no urgency to press and regain the ball and no concerted pressure in the last twenty minutes.

Our opponents are in pretty shocking form at the moment yet they came to OT and looked thoroughly comfortable with their manager making substitutions in the last ten minutes geared towards winning the game – there is no fear factor left.

Shocking attitude and lack of hunger amongst our squad, who have basically downed tools since the derby defeat. The players are rotten.

The players just seem to sulk when it appears the league has gone. It happened last season too, we looked in the title race until a few too many draws saw us fall well behind. The league campaign just went into freefall after that. This season top 4 is a must though, since we don't have some easily attainable cup route into the CL. Jose needs to remind the players that the league might be gone, but if they want to be in the champions league next season they need to pull their fingers out.

The manager should shoulder some of the blame it's his job to motivate the players at the end of the day.

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Mourinho looked absolutely exasperated on the touch line yesterday. Factor in his recent pronouncements about transfer money and it’s clear as day that he’s not happy with his lot. Looking at the garbage out on the pitch, I tend to agree with him that the team needs major surgery. It’s scary how far away this team is from the top and we have a very real battle to finish top four. I think we will end up sixth as things stand.

He will when he gets sacked like Moyes and LVG did. Problem is that those fecking passengers will stay on though.

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Yep, the players get a free pass and the manager gets the chop. In this case, though, I think we need to give Mou the time to gut the team and rebuild. My concern is that he won’t stick it out unless we back him with proper funds.

Like some others have said - Jose needs to take some of the blame for that, it's his job to keep the players motivated. That being said, they shouldn't need to rely on the manager to be motivated, they're professional athletes. Not to add, some of the games we've lost/drawn are games we should be winning easily - even if we didn't have a manager at the helm.

Like some others have said - Jose needs to take some of the blame for that, it's his job to keep the players motivated. That being said, they shouldn't need to rely on the manager to be motivated, they're professional athletes. Not to add, some of the games we've lost/drawn are games we should be winning easily - even if we didn't have a manager at the helm.

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Jose has kinda made a rod for his own back by chucking players under the bus. By stating he wants proper transfer market backing, he’s basically saying that he wants to upgrade various elements of the squad. In that context, it must be hard to keep certain players onside. The club needs to back Mourinho with money so he can carry out the necessary upgrades because it’ll drift badly otherwise. Current squad composition will lead us to ruin.

Mourinho looked absolutely exasperated on the touch line yesterday. Factor in his recent pronouncements about transfer money and it’s clear as day that he’s not happy with his lot. Looking at the garbage out on the pitch, I tend to agree with him that the team needs major surgery. It’s scary how far away this team is from the top and we have a very real battle to finish top four. I think we will end up sixth as things stand.

The great man becomes better with each passing day.

Yep, the players get a free pass and the manager gets the chop. In this case, though, I think we need to give Mou the time to gut the team and rebuild. My concern is that he won’t stick it out unless we back him with proper funds.

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What would you say if you're Avram Glazer and you look at the table? We're currently third, on paper we're doing better than last year. We've had a bad month but we don't look like we're in free fall. In short I think if Mourinho asks for more money they'll just tell him that his meeting their expectations and that he has to work with what he's got. I think he will get funds in the summer but I don't think he will be able to do any major surgery with it.

The players reach a point where they visibly stop putting in the appropriate level of effort, results go south and the clamour for change of management becomes irresistible.

Yesterday’s game against Southampton was painful to watch – no urgency to press and regain the ball and no concerted pressure in the last twenty minutes.

Our opponents are in pretty shocking form at the moment yet they came to OT and looked thoroughly comfortable with their manager making substitutions in the last ten minutes geared towards winning the game – there is no fear factor left.

Shocking attitude and lack of hunger amongst our squad, who have basically downed tools since the derby defeat. The players are rotten.

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You'd have a point if it was the same bunch of players. Such is the turnover there's a big difference between Jose and LvG's XI. Today's bunch almost completely different from the Moyes lineup.

What would you say if you're Avram Glazer and you look at the table? We're currently third, on paper we're doing better than last year. We've had a bad month but we don't look like we're in free fall. In short I think if Mourinho asks for more money they'll just tell him that his meeting their expectations and that he has to work with what he's got. I think he will get funds in the summer but I don't think he will be able to do any major surgery with it.

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Mourinho won’t be happy with third place though. If his expectations aren’t aligned with that of the board then I think he will walk.

What does this mean? I'm not being sarcastic or anything like that, mate.

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Yeah no problem mate, I mean that in a sense that it's the third manager now (discouting Giggsy here) with the best CV available really that we can can put question marks over. It's also the third different playstyle we get to see, three different 'philosophies' we have witnessed and nothing seems to be working. Even if we disregard Moyes as an absolute idiot and just look at LVG and Mourinho, it's two completely different styles, both were backed financially, still something's not working here.

Each manager brought in his own staff, own ideas, 'revolutionised' some of the things regarding training regimes and equipment, even if you look at LVG's CV and say that he's a fecking dinosaur because he last won a title during mediaeval times, Jose won the league with Chavski three years ago, it's not that bloody long now is it. The problem for me is that during each tenure, even if players and managers change, we still end up asking the same fecking question and pose the same hypotheses: 'has he lost the players' and 'the players look complacent/disinterested', we question their attitude and motivation. The complacency part happened even under the last years of Fergie's tenure but he was a fecking magician so he still managed to win the title.

Now the problem is that everybody started spending massive amounts of cash, City have the best manager they've ever had, generally speaking the level seems to have gone up and we still end up with the same shit, even if we're doing better than in recent post-Ferguson times. As @Feed Me said, the players are rotten, not sure how to fight it, whether some DoF will help the case or our transfer policy has to change to look for players who are showing certain character traits that we require, no idea really, but in the end it's the manager who gets chopped for whatever reason (it will be LVG's boring shite, Moyes' ineptitude, if we sack Jose the consensus will be defensive football) and the players are still getting massive cheques doing sweet feck all.

I think that usually the players are getting plenty of protection from the fans or ex-United pundits, because some of them played together, because some of them are English NT players, but Christ, some of the players we have right now are nothing short of passengers, even those that I like. I mean even putting the 'United level or not' debates aside, most of those players just don't have any fecking balls. It's no coincidence people like Cantona and Keane are recurrently popping up in all sort of discussions.

A DoF should be urgently installed, with a clear vision on how we are going to play for the next decade or so.

Give money to a manager, sack him when he fails, to only give the money to the other manager who decides that he doesn't fancy most of players the previous manager signed will lead us nowhere else but in mediocrity.

The players reach a point where they visibly stop putting in the appropriate level of effort, results go south and the clamour for change of management becomes irresistible.

Yesterday’s game against Southampton was painful to watch – no urgency to press and regain the ball and no concerted pressure in the last twenty minutes.

Our opponents are in pretty shocking form at the moment yet they came to OT and looked thoroughly comfortable with their manager making substitutions in the last ten minutes geared towards winning the game – there is no fear factor left.

Shocking attitude and lack of hunger amongst our squad, who have basically downed tools since the derby defeat. The players are rotten.

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The squad has long changed since Moyes' tenure here. Players downing tools is something that happens at almost every club eventually and is why the manager gets sacked and replaced (Chelsea as a club is a great example of this).

The squad has long changed since Moyes' tenure here. Players downing tools is something that happens at almost every club eventually and is why the manager gets sacked and replaced (Chelsea as a club is a great example of this).

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I agree that it is a normal trait across all clubs. Suppose as United fans we are still adjusting to the relatively new phenomenon given that such a thing literally didn’t happen to us for 25 years.

Also, the difference between us and Chelsea is that their squads have exhibited player power but generally backed it by doing the business on the pitch.

So when it was Moyes and LVG, the overall consensus on the Cafe and from most of the "OGs" was that it's totally their fault and a manager of Mourinho's quality will turn us in title contenders in a year or so.

Some people easily forget what vitriol and abuse they were spouting at Van Gaal merely a year and a half ago. Even when I suggested before the Soton game that we tend to implode after losing an important game and I see us continuing drawing games, I was called entitled, impatient and someone who just criticises for the sake of it.

One interesting sub point that’s worth raising here is that there were reports recently that senior members of the squad (I think it was Carrick, Young and Ibra) were annoyed by the application levels of the squad in general.

I just don’t think we have enough players with the requisite personality.

A DoF should be urgently installed, with a clear vision on how we are going to play for the next decade or so.

Give money to a manager, sack him when he fails, to only give the money to the other manager who decides that he doesn't fancy most of players the previous manager signed will lead us nowhere else but in mediocrity.

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This imo is vital. The DoF also needs to make sure we only hire manager who fit into our vision and not switch from a pragmatist, to philosophy manager, to a pragmatist and so on. The managers we hire need to just as much fit the profile of our vision as the players we buy and this only works if we have someone in charge who can build this without disruption for a decade or longer.

The players reach a point where they visibly stop putting in the appropriate level of effort, results go south and the clamour for change of management becomes irresistible.

Yesterday’s game against Southampton was painful to watch – no urgency to press and regain the ball and no concerted pressure in the last twenty minutes.

Our opponents are in pretty shocking form at the moment yet they came to OT and looked thoroughly comfortable with their manager making substitutions in the last ten minutes geared towards winning the game – there is no fear factor left.

Shocking attitude and lack of hunger amongst our squad, who have basically downed tools since the derby defeat. The players are rotten.

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Can't comment on the other managers. Regarding the current squad, have you noticed that the same 11 players + Ibra have been playing 3 games in a week? I mean we are worse than bottom clubs, squad players are either injured, unplayable or never used.

Yeah no problem mate, I mean that in a sense that it's the third manager now (discouting Giggsy here) with the best CV available really that we can can put question marks over. It's also the third different playstyle we get to see, three different 'philosophies' we have witnessed and nothing seems to be working. Even if we disregard Moyes as an absolute idiot and just look at LVG and Mourinho, it's two completely different styles, both were backed financially, still something's not working here.

Each manager brought in his own staff, own ideas, 'revolutionised' some of the things regarding training regimes and equipment, even if you look at LVG's CV and say that he's a fecking dinosaur because he last won a title during mediaeval times, Jose won the league with Chavski three years ago, it's not that bloody long now is it. The problem for me is that during each tenure, even if players and managers change, we still end up asking the same fecking question and pose the same hypotheses: 'has he lost the players' and 'the players look complacent/disinterested', we question their attitude and motivation. The complacency part happened even under the last years of Fergie's tenure but he was a fecking magician so he still managed to win the title.

Now the problem is that everybody started spending massive amounts of cash, City have the best manager they've ever had, generally speaking the level seems to have gone up and we still end up with the same shit, even if we're doing better than in recent post-Ferguson times. As @Feed Me said, the players are rotten, not sure how to fight it, whether some DoF will help the case or our transfer policy has to change to look for players who are showing certain character traits that we require, no idea really, but in the end it's the manager who gets chopped for whatever reason (it will be LVG's boring shite, Moyes' ineptitude, if we sack Jose the consensus will be defensive football) and the players are still getting massive cheques doing sweet feck all.

I think that usually the players are getting plenty of protection from the fans or ex-United pundits, because some of them played together, because some of them are English NT players, but Christ, some of the players we have right now are nothing short of passengers, even those that I like. I mean even putting the 'United level or not' debates aside, most of those players just don't have any fecking balls. It's no coincidence people like Cantona and Keane are recurrently popping up in all sort of discussions.

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Ah right fair enough mate. I agree with all that but I just like to add that hiring 1 clown and two managers with 2 completely different philosophies. Thats the problem right there for me. Everyone is brought their own ideas and ultimately nothing really worked with these players - which is why we need a DoF in my opinion, who has a clear view of identity the club. At the minute we're looking rudderless. Whist at City they've been preparing for Pep for years. It's no coincidence once SAF left we've lost direction. I don't think throwing money at the problem will change anything until we have a clear structure at the club. Think the footballing side of the club is run by fecking amateurs. Sir Alex literally held everything together through his unrivalled motivation to succeed. He really is a giant of the game.

People keep making the mistake of rushing to fault effort and passion. It's the ability to get the all down and consistently play cohesive fluid football that is and has always been the issue. That's what the manager has to work on. The likes of Rashford, Lingard, Lukaku, Mata and co ( who played yesterday) are running around a lot. That is not the issue.

This imo is vital. The DoF also needs to make sure we only hire manager who fit into our vision and not switch from a pragmatist, to philosophy manager, to a pragmatist and so on. The managers we hire need to just as much fit the profile of our vision as the players we buy and this only works if we have someone in charge who can build this without disruption for a decade or longer.

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Indeed. Now if we sack Mourinho, we would probably go for someone like Pochetino, which makes not much sense, considering that he plays totally different football. Someone like Simeone would be a continuity though.

Similarly, when LVG was sacked, we should have got someone like Pep, not Mourinho who plays totally different.

This type of changing the style every couple of years cannot work and so most of the money is spend on replacing players in order to fit the style, rather than actually getting better players. It could easily be argued than bar in midfield, we are worse in both attack and defense than we were when Fergie left. 700m pounds in transfers not spend well IMO.

People keep making the mistake of rushing to fault effort and passion. It's the ability to get the all down and consistently play cohesive fluid football that is and has always been the issue. That's what the manager has to work on. The likes of Rashford, Lingard, Lukaku, Mata and co ( who played yesterday) are running around a lot. That is not the issue.

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The reason I made this thread is because it was abundantly clear yesterday that the players weren’t doing the basics. 0-0 with 20 minutes to play and we were sitting off and failing to press. Where was the urgency to push for a winner? It was pathetic – they had settled for a draw.

Mourinho looked absolutely exasperated on the touch line yesterday. Factor in his recent pronouncements about transfer money and it’s clear as day that he’s not happy with his lot. Looking at the garbage out on the pitch, I tend to agree with him that the team needs major surgery. It’s scary how far away this team is from the top and we have a very real battle to finish top four. I think we will end up sixth as things stand.

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Every team is far away from City and the top, who are having a freak season. We have improved since last year, and at the begining of the season everyone was purring about the potential of this team. We've had a bad 2 weeks, not helped by a bad run of injuries to key team members.

Granted, it's Jose's job to manage that but it's a convergence of injuries, players losing form, and a City team who have had a start the likes of which has never been seen.

With all due respect, to make a prediction of us continuing to fall and finish in 6th is looking at the last 2 weeks only, which is a fickle and short sighted point of view.

Indeed. Now if we sack Mourinho, we would probably go for someone like Pochetino, which makes not much sense, considering that he plays totally different football. Someone like Simeone would be a continuity though.

Similarly, when LVG was sacked, we should have got someone like Pep, not Mourinho who plays totally different.

This type of changing the style every couple of years cannot work and so most of the money is spend on replacing players in order to fit the style, rather than actually getting better players. It could easily be argued than bar in midfield, we are worse in both attack and defense than we were when Fergie left. 700m pounds in transfers not spend well IMO.

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I don’t see why Poch would come to us tbh. We aren’t the draw we think we are.

A DoF should be urgently installed, with a clear vision on how we are going to play for the next decade or so.

Give money to a manager, sack him when he fails, to only give the money to the other manager who decides that he doesn't fancy most of players the previous manager signed will lead us nowhere else but in mediocrity.